Where did you get that picie from Nick? Not seen that one before - it is obviuosly slightly out of date - the western section of the airport route has now been cancelled from phase 3, and some of the station names e.g. North Manchester Business Park, have changed their names.

Statement to Parliament by the Transport Secretary committing £520 million of public funds to Manchester's transport network and regarding the Metrolink. Delivered: 16 December 2004.
The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Alistair Darling):

In July this year I told Parliament that because of excessive cost increases I would have to withdraw funding for the Phase III extensions to Manchester Metrolink.

Looking at the proposals, it has become increasingly clear there are real and persistent problems with the costs of the extensions. The public sector funding requirement has almost tripled since we first approved the project. Nevertheless, I have decided to commit over half a billion pounds, the sum previously agreed to fund Phase III, to Manchester's transport network. Manchester will also be able to bid for additional funds from the new Transport Innovation Fund. It is now up to the transport authority to come forward with proposals for how this funding is used.

Looking at the history of the Metrolink proposals shows the problems it has had with huge increases in public funding requirements:

* July 2000 public sector funding was approved with an up front budget of £282 million, for three lines to: Oldham and Rochdale, Ashton and the airport, plus some upgrading of the existing system.
* December 2002, this budget had to be increased to £520 million (including £60m local contribution). We made clear that there would be no more money from the Department. The Manchester authorities accepted they would meet the costs of any further increases.
* December 2003, Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Executive (GMPTE) returned to ask us for still more money, but for a reduced project. The three new lines were reduced to 2 ½ , with the line to the airport replaced with a shorter spur to East Didsbury.

The public sector funding requirement was going up and up - partly because of private sector pessimism about light rail, and partly because of failings in the original cost estimates. There was no guarantee that costs would not continue to rise. This led to my decision last July to withdraw funding for this project, and to ask GMPTE to work with us to look at alternatives that would benefit Manchester, but at a better price.

Following this decision, a working group was set up with GMPTE and chaired by Tony McNulty. Its purpose was to see whether light rail could be made affordable in Manchester and to consider alternatives. I also appointed my own financial and technical consultants.

The potential cost to taxpayers of the proposed extensions is now clearer:

* confirm that at least £600 million public sector up front funding would be needed to build just 2 lines - Oldham-Rochdale and Ashton. Our judgement is that there is a strong chance that costs would be even higher.
* told Tony McNulty on 7 December that about £900 million of up front funding would be needed for delivery of the original three lines over the next ten years - a tripling since the original approval. There is no guarantee this would not increase further.

In the light of this, I have considered the options for the way forward. GMPTE wants me to agree to their continuing with their current procurement for the three lines. That would mean committing to upfront public sector funding of £900 million, when only four years ago we capped the figure at £282 million. I cannot do that. No Government could ignore these huge increases - a three-fold increase in just four years. And accepting this price would consume too much of the money that will be available for transport including in the North-West in future years. In addition, a scheme for substantially less than three lines would need a new procurement or risk legal challenge. I have therefore told GMPTE that the current procurement should not be revived.

Nor can I agree to GMPTE's alternative of starting a new procurement to enable construction of the three lines to be phased over a longer period. This would not address the fundamental problem of cost escalation.

I am however confirming that the £520 million budget is still available for Manchester, subject to GMPTE developing a satisfactory plan for these areas. This represents a major investment in Manchester, enabling a package of measures to address the transport problems in these parts of the city, which may include light rail improvements.

We have already provided some £170 million of the £520 million. Around £80 million was for GMPTE to buy the concession for the operation of Metrolink. This has continuing value to generate revenue for GMPTE and give them greater control over the tram network. The rest has been for advance works and buying land, some of which may still be required for the package that GMPTE now develop.

GMPTE are able to supplement this budget, both from their own resources and by bidding for funding from government through the Transport Innovation Fund (TIF). The TIF is available for authorities which propose innovative and coherent schemes to tackle congestion and encourage modal shift which could act as 'exemplars' for others facing similar challenges. This provides a real opportunity for Manchester to look at its transport policy across the piece and develop a bold integrated package.

The budget I am committing today provides the opportunity for a major transport investment package for these areas of Manchester. It is now up to the Manchester authorities to make the most of this opportunity, and to come forward with proposals that will deliver the transport improvements that these areas need.

It's a joke most week days - and I've spent many a night wondering why the hell I'm standing around waiting for a bus when a brisk 30 minute walk would have me in town without the disgusting stench of an Oxford Road bus on my clothes for the rest of the evening.

Couldn't describe it any better Hamnet. The majority of these museum pieces (often seen in the background of tv series 'Heartbeat') are totally filthy - pratically an embarrassment to friends and family who visit our 'world class' city.
Last time I caught one of these, some little f*ckers had set fire to the top deck - one down I suppose.

Metrokurt - your point about the student area's becoming deserted:
Manchester is a different place from a even a few years back. Withington (for example which is not so student heavy) now has a larger propotion of people staying on over the summer with the effect you barely notice term time had finished.
Ok there are no '100 plus' passengers waiting to board next to the library in Withington of a morning, but generally it's pretty much play as usual.

I've recently returned from a trip to Berlin (Prisc - it is a great city - perhaps more on that later).
The transport (as you would expect in efficient Germany) is second to none.
We used the U-Bahn most of the time we were there - literally ran like clockwork.
You only dip down a few steps (great when you have a pushchair to tour around the city!) to hit this underground system. Most of the U bahn trains were old stock, not that this mattered, they were clean and modernised (all had electronic screens in each cabin for example - showing crap but welcome all the same).
Every station felt safe (at all hours) and easy to use - the one ticket for all modes of transportation should be bleedin standard.

I accept that Berlin is a much larger and importan city than our own (though to be fair they are skint at the moment, not that you would know from the vibe and look of the place), but it angers me to return our own (and we are luckier than others) medieval means of getting around.
Car is king, but it ain't as fun/enviro friendly/social as buses/trams/trains etc.

North, I think you have hit the nail on the head, in this country car is king, and until the cost of petrol becomes prohibatively expensive, such that people actually start realising the need for a decent public transport system, we are stuck with second rate shite over here.

From memory, Berlin has 35 tram route, several U-Bahn lines and a host off trolley buses, and bus routes - you can buy a ticket to travel on all public transport in the Berlin region for about €2 or €3.

It'll come back and bite this country, when the cost of petrol does reach $100 a barrel, then our economy will suffer much much more than our continental friends since they have much more of an infrastructure in place to cope with less car use.

Oxford Road has surpassed saturation point for traffic. Whenever I have the misfourtune of getting a 142 from Piccadilly to Withington it'll be half an hour before I see the Holy Name.

Kurt you can't say it's alright cos there are tons of buses, they clot the place up. UK North, Finglands, Bullocks, Stagecoach all vying for attention on this one stretch of road. Think about how filthy the air must be on Oxford Road when you have hundreds of cars and buses sitting there. A high speed underground line would be expensive, how about a much cheaper elevated metrolink line? Need one down Deansgate too, that's bumper to bumper 24/7 though at least it's not packed with kenyan Magic Buses that are older than your gran.

Though an Oxford/Wilmslow Road elevated line would probably **** up St Peters Square if it were to join onto the other lines directly. We could replace Elizabeth House with some kind of elevated terminus.

Just to re-iterate the points about the buses.

Had a shitty time at Piccadilly on Friday. 5.30pm. Trying to get a bus home. There were maybe 35 buses in total gridlock around the bus station. Many of these filthy, outdated, polluting beasts, all with their engines going. Every time the lights changed every few minutes about 4 buses managed to get out, and 4 into the bus station. There were huge crowds of people waiting for buses.

Now, 8/10 of these buses will end up going down Portland Street, turn left down Princess Street, down Whitworth Street and onto Oxford Road. This jam usually consumes all of Portland Street, and Oxford/Wilmslow Road down past the MRI. It's the same every rush hour.

Now of course every city has it's jams, but this is just stupid. We have 100s of cramped, smelly, expensive buses pumping out shite while moving incredibly slowing around town at that time. We could try some new traffic management scheme but that would require a much bigger bus station at the Gardens which probably won't happen, why not just build *something* down Oxford Road, with additional stops on Portland Street and at the Gardens. We need it. It'd be so much faster, efficient, cleaner. One big tram/train could carry as many people as 10 buses.

Underground, overground, on the street, whatever it is, sort that ******* mess out.

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"Manchester is located in the center of Lancashire plain in northwestern England like a big circle theatre."

Underground, overground, on the street, whatever it is, sort that ******* mess out.

They're not going to sort that ******* mess out!

I don't think Oxford Rd/Wilmslow Rd is an essential thoroughfare for cars, with Upper Brook St and Princess Parkway both more or less parallel to it.

What would work is an on-street high frequency tram leaving Picc bus station (connections rest of Metrolink network), going south to Didsbury village (connections to Stockport/South Manchester metrolink).

Let's call it phase 5, phase 4 being Stockport.

Of course, I'd love a metrolink (cut and cover)underground, but this (as Metrolink says) wouldn't get funded. Unless there's a massive shift in all kinds of things, including being forced out of our cars.

To increase viability, then some trams could go all the way to Stockport, some down Palatine Rd to Northenden/Northern Moor? By that time though, I'll be a pensioner.

This was the road tunnel under the existing live railway line, the interchange itself, the finback bridge for trams over the mainline rail track, public realm and 'the seed' sculpture in the 'squareabout' between One Central Park and Fujitsu.

Balfour Beatty were the main contractors and are justifiably proud of the sexy (in civil engineering terms) project. It's just a shame that the metrolink part of the project is being mothballed until the Rochdale line is ready.

BEFORE: The bridge is constructed road-side.
BEFORE: The bridge is constructed road-side.
A NEW Metrolink bridge weighing 4,000 tons has been swung into place across a railway line.

A tram station is being built at Central Park, a new business park, in Newton Heath. And to link it to a tramline, engineers needed to design a bridge over a railway slicing through the site.

Building the bridge over the line would have meant months of disruption to rail passengers, so it was built next to the railway line then swung into place in one night.

The railway line from Manchester to Rochdale was closed overnight from Saturday to Sunday as the 130-metre bridge was rotated into place on a series of steel plates, using a 125-tonne jack.

The bridge, which has been funded by £36.5m of public money from Manchester City Council, GMPTE and the European Regional Development Fund, will form part of a new tramline to Oldham and Rochdale as part of the Big Bang expansion of Metrolink. It will sit between Monsall and Dean Lane stops - just minutes from the city centre.

Under the Big Bang plans, three new lines were to be built linking the network to Oldham, Rochdale, Ashton and Manchester Airport.

The government initially promised a £520m package for the plan, but Transport Secretary Alistair Darling made the shock announcement it was `not approved' last summer after the price rose to around £900m.

Following a campaign by the Manchester Evening News, the government restored the cash and talks are under way between transport bosses and the government on how the expansion will now go forward, with an announcement expected later this year. Work on major projects such as the Metrolink bridge has continued in the expectation that the Oldham and Rochdale line will be built.

The bridge has a twisting design because it has to pass over the railway but then quickly drop under a road bridge.

It was built in a joint venture between Balfour Beatty and German contractor Bilfinger Berger.

Barry Jessop, contracts manager for Balfour Beatty, said: "Most of the hard work had been done beforehand and it was a fairly simple manoeuvre, but it is certainly a unique project and we were very happy to complete it within the rail closure.

"Had we built the bridge over the railway it would have meant a series of closures, which is why we built it next to the line.

"It is a unique bridge because of its very curved shape and because it is so large. Technically the project has been a once in a lifetime experience for the team because it is so challenging and unusual."

The bridge was built `upside-down' with the support on the top of the bridge and has another metre to go before it is in its permanent position.

Mr Jessop said they were hoping to fix the bridge in position in the next few weeks.

There are no further plans to close the railway line while this takes place.

Central Park, off Oldham Road, has been developed by New East Manchester to bring business into the area.

Software firm Fujitsu has opened offices at the site and a new research and employee centre, supported by MANCAT and the University of Manchester, is under construction.

Article in this months Tramways and Urban Transit about the progression off phase 3 - basically it just confirms that DfT and GMPTE are in discussions relating to how phase 3 will progress - we should have much more detail by the end off 2005.

Given the preperation work continuing so fast, Rochdale to have trams in 2008 is my prediction, Ashton 2009, airport 2011 / 12.

THOUSANDS of commuters were hit today by a major power failure on the Metrolink tram system.

Travellers were stranded on trams across Greater Manchester for nearly two hours after services were brought to a standstill.

According to Metrolink, seven trams containing passengers were running at the time of the failure. They were stopped immediately and signals switched to red as a precaution.

Delays affected the whole network, including the Eccles and Altrincham to Bury lines.

Engineers

Engineers were called in to tackle the problem and managed to restore power to the network by 8am. By the time services were resumed, many stations were packed with a backlog of passengers.

The cause of the power failure, which is believed to have happened in the central Manchester depot, is being investigated by Metrolink bosses. A spokesman said: "All the trams that were out were stopped and all the signals were switched to red.

"Nobody could get anywhere. Engineers were at the scene from 7am and went out to individual carriages.

"Services resumed at 8am, although the network was very busy.

"The whole system was affected, but there were not that many passengers on board trams at the time the fault occurred, as our trams start running at 6.30am. We do not know the cause of the fault at the moment, but we are investigating."

United Utilities said it had no reports of a fault regarding its supply and a spokesman said the power failure was a matter for Metrolink.

I hate to get pedantic metrolink but I'm going to have to make an exemption in this case. I usually ignore most grammatical bad habits and put it down to just a bit of cyber-slang, but I've never seen 'of' substituted for the completely different 'off' before.
I'm sorry ML but somebody had to point this out to you. Maybe you're such a super-fast typist and lazy at the same time?